


Not Invited (But I'm Glad I Made It)

by notalone91



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, But I Love Them, M/M, Miscommunication, Myra Kaspbrak is there for flavour, Richie's manager is a concept, Sonia Kaspbrak is a memory, Wedding Interrupted, then SO MUCH GOOD COMMUNICATION, they're dumb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-17 20:46:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28606176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notalone91/pseuds/notalone91
Summary: Richie Tozier is getting married.  Eddie Kaspbrak is not invited.  What happened?  Can they work this out?  Just wait...Excerpt:"You’ve had months to call; to explain that bullshit note.  So why now?  Why on my wedding day?”  As soon as he said it, it seemed to ramp his anger up further.  “God, I’m getting fucking married today."  He turned in a circle, searching the ceiling for some sort of an answer.  When he finally settled on Eddie’s face, the only thing he could see was the shame.  He laughed emptily.  "But you know all about that, don’t you?”  He waited for a response.  Nothing.  “Just go back to your wife,” he spat.  The disgust even made Bev jump.Eddie looked at the floor.  If this was the last time he was ever going to see Richie, he didn’t want it.  He deserved it and would stand there and take his licks, but this wasn’t the last memory he wanted of his Richie.  [...] This Richie?  This Richie hated him.  And rightfully so, he supposed.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 4
Kudos: 49





	Not Invited (But I'm Glad I Made It)

**Author's Note:**

> This was heavily inspired by the Maroon 5 song Wait which is on the loop at my work and my daydreaming became Eddie as the song's narrator and I gave myself a bad case of The Sads. Also, though, Say Something (the pentatonix version) White Horse and This Is Me Trying were all on the playlist I listened to while writing, in case you were wondering where I ended 2020 Tonally.

“YOU DID WHAT?!”

Beverly Marsh’s voice echoed through the line and, for a moment, it was like she was sitting right on the pool deck with him. Richie Tozier had never been one to rush into anything, so-

Okay, that’s a lie, but even he had to admit that, maybe asking his manager to marry him less than six months after getting back from Derry was a bit rash. Especially considering that they weren’t exactly dating in the first place. They were fucking. Had been for years. But they weren’t together. They’d been talking about it simply because someone had asked if they were together or not. Then, one thing led to another and they were buying engagement rings and signing prenups

So, it fell on Bev to be the voice of reason, especially since Stan would definitely have been asleep. When the group chat got the notification, she’d called him immediately. “Well, what about Eddie?” she asked quietly. It was a sore subject, she knew, but it was more than a valid question. It was a legitimate concern.

“Fuck him.”

Bev’s mouth shut, teeth clicking together and trapping the answer she so desperately wanted to let slip inside. Instead, she simply released a put-upon sigh and then switched immediately into supportive Maid of Honor mode. “So, how soon are we talking here? What are we thinking for venues?”

Eddie Kaspbrak had beaten the odds. Time and time again, he’d bested death. That day was no different.

When Ben suggested a flight in a fighter jet, he hadn’t expected for a moment that Ben Hanscom would be the damn pilot himself. He loved his friend, he did, but once he realized what was happening and it was too late to back out, there was a moment where he desperately wanted to. Still, once he’d realized that they were, relatively speaking, safe, it was exhilarating. He could see why people did it. The weightlessness was unlike anything else. All of the world’s problems seemed to disappear.

“Can we do that again tomorrow,” he asked, sipping down his too-expensive coffee from Ben’s favorite spot in town.

Ben shook his head. “We can’t. Remember, it’s Richie’s we-”

In that moment, gravity caught up to them like a freight train. Ben looked down guiltily. The Losers had been sworn to secrecy. Eddie wasn’t invited and thus wasn’t to know. Even though 4 out of 5 of the other Losers had tried to make Richie see reason, there was no convincing him. Stan even went so far as to suggest that maybe the reason he didn’t want Eddie to know or be there, Eddie, his best friend, who he’d literally carried away from certain death and had designated himself as caregiver personally, was that he knew it was wrong and that seeing him would make him realize as much; That maybe, just maybe, he should return one of the hundreds of phone calls from Eddie that had dwindled off; That maybe he was missing some information that he would regret. That statement had gotten Stan the cold shoulder for a week. As much as he appreciated the peace, it was enough. They’d already lost 27 years. He didn’t need any more time away. The rest of the Losers learned their lesson along with

In the minutes that felt like hours that passed between Ben and Eddie, he felt his heart shatter. “His what, Ben?” His friend’s lips remained sealed. “His wedding? You can tell me.” Seeing the conflict, he sighed. “You know that Richie is a celebrity right? And I follow his fiance on Instagram, so…”

Ben’s eyes widened. “I hadn’t even thought-” Suddenly, it dawned on him just how horrible they’d all been to Eddie. “Are you-” He stopped himself short. Of course he wasn’t alright. He knew better than to ask that. “How long have you known?”

It was a pretty simple lie. “The whole time, really,” he fibbed. He had seen the picture of their hands with rings. Of course, he had. Even though he didn’t know the context or if it was serious, Eddie didn’t need to see Richie’s face to know it was him. He just knew. The pile of horrendous shirts, the ugly blue pair of wannabe bowling shoes, The electric Bass in the corner gathering dust. It was Richie. Plus, that hand had been-

Well, everywhere. He’d held that hand for years. He’d watched that hand win at street fighter when they were kids. He’d stolen licks off of the ice cream held in that hand. That hand had grabbed him by the neck and pulled him in for their first kiss when they were 14. That hand had stripped him bare the night before he left Derry, clinging to him tightly, begging him not to go. That hand had reassured him over and over again in their second battle against IT. That hand had helped nurse him back to health after carrying him out of the sewer. That hand had… 

He decided only to give Ben the scarcest overview. It wasn’t that he was mad at them. If they knew why it wasn’t his own hand joining Richie’s, they’d all hate him. He couldn’t bear the thought of that.

Still, Ben offered sympathy. “Are you okay? I don’t know exactly what happened, but there’s still time to fix it.”

Eddie smiled sadly. “No, I think I fucked that up royally, Ben,” he said.

“Call me a hopeless romantic, but I don’t think it’s over until they’re pronounced husbands at about 3:30 tomorrow afternoon,” Ben said. He knew it was wrong, but this? The hurt on Eddie’s face? That was worse. 

If he was wrong, he’d apologize until the end of time.

But he wasn’t wrong.

Richie’s bachelor party was winding down. The Losers were the only ones left in Richie’s living room and, honestly, it was better that way.

He and Bev were stoned, laying on the couch and stargazing at the patterns in the ceiling. Stan and Mike were deeply engrossed in a game of Mario Kart. Ben and Bill were moping separately with different reactions to the same phenomenon.

The absence of Eddie.

Ben was heartsick for the pair. He had half a mind to drag him here and force them to talk. But Richie had put a moratorium on any and all talk of him. He figured bringing him here might have been a little too pushy.

On the other hand, Bill was still seething mad from the mere mention of him earlier. He had been the only one Richie told when the incident occurred.

Richie had called him, hysterically crying. He’d finally slept with Eddie. Somehow, it had been better than he’d imagined.

And then.

The next morning Richie woke up in bed alone. Eddie and all of his things were gone. The only sign he’d been there at all was the full coffee pot and Richie’s favorite mug beside it with a note that read “I’m sorry. This isn’t right. I need to see Myra.” The phone rang to voicemail every time he called. For 3 days, he tried.

Each day, he grew more and more despondent.

Each day, Bill grew more and more pissed.

On the seventh day, the Lord rested, or so they say. Well, on the seventh day of no contact from Eddie, Bill raged into action. Richie was inconsolable. For all anyone knew, he’d been hurt or killed. With that in mind, Bill took off for New York, thanking his lucky stars that Eddie’s business was listed and with that information and his cell number, it was easy enough to find his address. 

Myra looked him up and down once as he stood in the doorway. “You’re not the comedian,” she assessed, leaning against the doorframe. “You’re the author. What do you want?”

Taken aback by the striking resemblance between the woman and Eddie’s mother, he stepped back. He felt all of 12 years old which, somehow, pissed him off even more. “I need to talk to Eddie.” He could see him in a doorway down the hall. “It’s important. I’m worried ab-”   


“Oh, like I was worried when you people whisked him off to Maine?” she scoffed indignantly. “I don’t really care how you feel, to be perfectly honest. He’s with me where he belongs.” She stepped forward and chased him down one more step, leaving him flat on Alexander Avenue. “You can tell that trashy so-called comedian that Eddie is mine. I’ve forgiven him for abandoning me, but he’ll never be seeing him again. None of you will! How’s that for an ending?” She slammed the door, leaving Bill stunned.

Yeah, Richie had hit that nail right on the head. Carbon copy of his mother Jesus. For a split second, he debated going back in and rescuing Eddie, just carrying him out fireman style. But Eddie wasn’t some damsel and Myra wasn’t some monster. They were adults. He had just killed a millennia-old being for fuck’s sake. If he wasn’t leaving, he didn’t want to. 

If he didn’t want to…

What Bill didn’t know was that just behind those Queen Anne doors, a storm had broken loose. “You’ve forgiven me?” Eddie asked quietly. “For what, exactly, Myra?” His voice was low, almost grave.

Myra took a step back. “You startled me,” she whimpered. “That’s not very good for a woman in my state. I’m going to go upstairs.” She made the motion to do so, then paused. “Be a lamb and make me a cup of chamomile tea. My nerves are-”

“Fine enough to belittle my oldest friend in the world without giving it a second thought,” he finished for her. “Now, remind me again why you’ve forgiven me? Did I cheat on you?”

“You may as well have,” she spat, cheeks tinged a bright pink. “You ran off to be with those awful, rotten-”

That was enough. “Did I fake a suicide attempt? Lie about the nature of my being here? I am here, Myra, until the stabilizers kick in, which is why I’m making sure you take them. I am, then, going to go to Richie and I am going to be with him for the rest of my life.” she clutched her chest and started to take raspy, rattling breath that made her whole body shake like a demented children's toy from the 90's. “Oh, don’t start with that. Somehow, despite all external evidence to the contrary, your body is perfectly healthy. Your head-”

She feigned shock, then decided against it. She moved toward him. Eddie sidestepped his wife, sliding his wedding ring off. "Don’t you dare," she growled.

"Why?" Eddie asked, one hand firmly on the door. "You know how you've always been terrified that you'd turn into your mother? That'll never happen," he laughed. He just couldn’t wrap his mind around what he was doing. More than that, he couldn't believe he hadn’t done it sooner. "Somehow, you became mine." 

Eddie opened the door and moved through it. When he'd attempted to close it, he found Myra halfway out of it. "Don’t do this!" She shouted, following him down the front steps. "Don't leave me, Eddie!" He left her sobbing on the street in front of their house in the same spot she'd left Bill. 

Apparently, their minds were all connected at that moment. Ben and Bill were the first to outwardly admit it. “Eddie should be here,” they said. Despite the unified delivery, the perspectives were entirely different. Ben was sad, nostalgic. He was noting the clear absence of one of the pillars of their group. Bill, on the other hand, was pissed. The dynamic of his friendships with all of the other Losers had changed so much because he was hiding what they knew and- dammit- he missed Eddie, too. 

Richie nearly fell off the couch. So far, everyone had been humoring him. It was his bachelor party. He should have been having fun with his friends. It was one simple request: Leave. Him. Out of it. “No,” Bill immediately said, trying to walk it back, seeing Richie’s reaction. “No, because we care about Richie. This isn’t-”

“Actually,” Mike said guiltily, “I facetime with him pretty regularly.”

Bev slid her hand into Richie’s. “We love you, honey. We do. But…” she sighed, trying to gauge the betrayal. “We love him too. We can’t just-”

Richie stood up. Once, then twice, he seemed like he was going to speak. Instead, he retreated into the bedroom, slamming the door behind him.

“Well… that went well,” Stan groaned, leaning over onto his side. He shook his head and looked at Bill. “You know there are two sides to this, don’t you?” As the only Loser who knew both sides, Stan decided that it was time for this all to end. 

Baffled by the knowledge that everyone else had been in contact with Eddie, Bill had no other choice but to listen as they told him the bits and pieces that they knew. He swallowed hard and stared at his hands. “Now, what do we do?”

Sitting alone on his couch, Eddie sobbed. He’d lied to Ben. He hadn’t known for sure and he certainly hadn’t known they were already getting married. Richie had him blocked, he’d unfollowed the fiance because it hurt too much, and he…

He thought he had time. He hadn’t realized how thoroughly fucked up he’d let everything get. Bill still wasn’t answering his calls. Richie… he couldn’t even bring himself to make that call anymore.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

As he downed the last of his gin martini, he felt a vibration across the couch. He reached for it and, upon seeing the screen, nearly dropped his phone in his rush to answer it. 

“I fucked up,” admitted the voice on the other end sheepishly. “I fucked up and I should have told you and now it might be too late to fix it.” Steeling his nerves, he sat silently and listened to every word. The caller’s voice trembled as they told him all of it. Every detail. “I’m so sorry, Eddie. Please,” they said, finally dissolving into messy, broken sobs. “Please, come. Please…”

Eight hours passed and Eddie was groggily exiting the airport. With bleary eyes, he scanned the crowd at the arrivals gate. 

“Eddie!” Bill charged at him, sweeping him into a hug. “I didn’t think-” He fought off the stammer that was, once again, waning since Derry. “I’m sorry. I should’ve let you talk. I should have heard you out.”

He shook his head. “No. No, I should have talked to Richie. I shouldn’t have just left.” Bill’s silence was his agreement. There would be no argument there. “I’m not too late, am I?”

The pair exited the terminal. “I don’t think so. You should have seen him last night, Eds” The walk to the car was quick. On the drive to the venue, Bill listened carefully as his friend explained it all to him. It wouldn’t take much for Eddie to convince Richie past that. They were soulmates. Everyone else knew that from the time they were 12 and became the center of each other’s attention.

They just needed to figure it out for themselves.

By the time they got to the venue, an orchard just north of the city, Eddie was sure he was going to have an asthma attack.

Quietly, Richie’s voice popped into the back of his head, as it so often did, to remind him that it wasn’t  _ ever  _ asthma; it was a panic attack. They’d always been panic attacks. They would always be panic attacks.

When he’d been in the hospital after Derry, Richie hadn’t left his side. He’d been there through it all. They’d fallen right back into all of the same old patterns. Nothing was ever said, but he assumed it was known.

He didn’t think he needed to say it.

He loved Richie.

Simple and plain. That was it. Eddie Kaspbrak loved Richie Tozier.

Stopped on the steps of the huge old farmhouse where Richie’s half of the wedding party was preparing, he steadied himself. Bill gave his shoulders a reassuring squeeze and pushed him right through the door. The first person to catch his eye wasn’t one of the Losers at all. It was Maggie Tozier. He quickly turned back.

True to form, Bill pushed him forward, even if he wasn’t comfortable with it. He steered him past the room where the Toziers were preparing and into a white door marked Losers Lounge.

Eddie was half tempted to mark a huge red V over the S. Instead, Bill pounded out “shave and a haircut,” rolling his eyes in a way that clearly implied that Richie was the only one who enjoyed the secret knock.

“All clear,” Ben said, clearly trying not to be too loud.

The door creaked open a little, Mike’s eye appearing in the crack before it swung wide. “Get in here, Benedict Arnold. The Americans aren’t far behind.” He pulled them in quickly, shutting the door behind them silently. 

From someplace buried deep in Bev’s arms, Eddie asked, “How did I become England in this scenario?”

They talked quietly among themselves for a few minutes before Stan finally mentioned the reason for his arrival. “So, are you ready to see him?”

Before he truly realized what was happening, Bev had called Richie, telling him that their brunch was there and, yes, that meant mimosas. “Just hurry up and get down here. Through the door from the tidy, bright dressing room, they could all hear the Groom’s answer from the echoey hall. “Make way,” he chorused as he slid in on the heels of his oxblood loafers, wood-paneled Ray-Bans over his glasses, his blue suit jacket flung over his shoulder, leaving him in his open dress shirt and black pants, suspenders clipped on wrong. 

They did. That is, of course, if they were to disregard the fact that Bill had shoved Eddie smack into the center of the room. When Richie opened the door, he was still standing there, suddenly keenly aware of how drunk the groom was and how long it had been since he himself had showered or brushed his teeth or changed out of the salmon polo and brown trousers he’d worn out with Ben.

It didn’t really sink in at first. “I do not have a drink in my hand and that, my friends, is a hate crime.” He was looking at Eddie as though nothing was amiss. Then, reality began to hit. Then, all at once, he was pissed. The steam was practically pouring from his ears. “No. No, this is the hate crime because, obviously, you do all hate me. What the fuck?”

No one answered. They were all waiting to see what happened next.

“Why the fuck is he here?” he asked, venom dripping from every word.

Bill stepped toward him. “Rich, I-”

“You went to get him, I assume? That’s why you were late?” The fire in his ice-blue eyes singed his friends. “So, tell me why?” He turned back to Eddie. “You’ve had months to call; to explain that bullshit note. So why now? Why on my wedding day?” As soon as he said it, it seemed to ramp his anger up further. “God, I’m getting fucking married today." He turned in a circle, searching the ceiling for some sort of an answer. When he finally settled on Eddie’s face, the only thing he could see was the shame. He laughed emptily. "But you know all about that, don’t you?” He waited for a response. Nothing. “Just go back to your wife,” he spat. The disgust even made Bev jump.

Eddie looked at the floor. If this was the last time he was ever going to see Richie, he didn’t want it. He deserved it and would stand there and take his licks, but this wasn’t the last memory he wanted of Richie.

His Richie, the Richie he fell in love with, laughed at and with him. The Richie he fell in love with would have hugged him as soon as he saw him. The Richie he fell in love with would never have yelled at him like this. The Richie he fell in love with loved him back. 

The Richie he fell in love with hadn’t had to deal with the thought of losing him over and over again, though. The Richie he fell in love with was secure in the fact that they would always come back together. That Richie was gone and it was all his fault. 

This Richie? 

This Richie hated him. And rightfully so, he supposed. 

“Fuck this,” he said. “Get out.” No one moved. Bev’s sympathetic reaching for him left him unmoved. He shoved her off. “All of you. Go.”

One thing none of them had ever excelled at was leaving one of their own hurt. They couldn’t and wouldn’t do it. Realizing that, Richie turned himself around and retreated for the hallway. 

Nobody else could push Eddie any further. If he still couldn’t do it, they were all fucked. 

Eddie’s mind turned out of control. He couldn’t let him leave. This wasn’t right. He just needed to get himself to- “Richie, wait!”

Against his better judgment, he did. “Now you wanna talk? Great fucking timing. Really.” He hung his head and made a disgusted noise deep in his throat. “Would have made more of an impact if you’d burst in when they ask for objections.” He continued walking toward the exit, hoping to make his escape. "What the fuck did you think was going to happen? Storm in, tear a cross off the wall, beat my dad with it and pull me onto a city bus?"

“That’s more your style,” Eddie said warmly, despite the nerves. “Besides, we couldn’t have actually talked. I want to talk. I want you to actually be able to consider what I’m saying.” Quickly, realizing that what he was asking was, indeed, a hell of a lot, he added. “You don’t have to actually consider it. Hell, you don’t even really have to listen. I’m just asking you to hear me out.” Finally catching up, he took one more chance. “Richie, look at me.” A silent moment passed filled with nothing. “Please?”

There was something in his voice that made Richie’s heart clench. He stopped, arm’s length from the door. He shut his eyes. Surprising both Eddie and himself, he turned back. He didn’t bother to disguise the hurt Eddie had caused. He didn’t even bother to speak any more. But he would listen. And then he would leave. 

Eddie’s heart skipped a beat. Not even a pointed jab. No words from Richie was, indeed, the strongest thing he could say. A silent Richie was a dangerous, uncharted thing. He was done for. 

The thought of that terrified Eddie. Even knowing he was fighting a losing battle. Knowing that, he still had to try. He couldn’t live with himself if he threw it all away. He took a breath in the vain hope of stability and began. “I left because I didn’t want to be a man who cheated on his wife. I went back to leave her. That’s the first thing you need to know.” Despite Richie’s unchanged expression, he stopped, taking a step closer. He dared himself to reach for Richie’s hand, but that was too far. Richie yanked his hand back. Folding his arms protectively over his chest, he continued. “Problem was, when I got there, she said no. She said that I had had a nervous breakdown and she would ‘help’ me because she ‘loved me’ and that’s what you do for people you love.” He scoffed and looked down at the floor. He still recoiled at the thought of it. Her angry, muffled sobs as she draped herself over his lap. “I flipped. I told her that I wasn’t in love with her. That I didn’t think I ever was… That I was in love with someone else.”

That got Richie’s attention. He looked up and furrowed his brows. 

Eddie nodded. “Yeah, pretty desperately, too. So, she, needless to say, lost it.” He pursed his lips and began picking at a loose thread along the hem of his shirt. He hated that he’d let everything go this far. Most of all, he hated how much he’d hurt Richie. “She tried to kill herself to make me stay.” He shook his head and covered his face, just the same ashamed way he did when the doctors came to him to explain it all. “The doctors told me I had to stay, at least until the meds kicked in. The day she got home was the day Bill showed up.”

”The what?” Richie hadn’t known anything about that. He looked over Eddie’s shoulder just in time to see Bill pushing all of the other Losers back in out of the hall, despite a strong protest from Bev.

Despite himself, Eddie almost smiled in relief, hearing his voice, even in short, monosyllabic sentences. “The day Bill showed up. As it turned out, she’d been playing me the whole time. She’d fucked with my phone, making it so that I couldn’t receive calls.” When Richie scoffed, he pulled it out of his pocket. “Look, I knew it sounded too convenient, but I took screenshots for the phone company and my lawyer.”

Richie nodded along until the penny dropped. “Lawyer?” he asked vacantly, as though the word was entirely foreign to him.

Thinking back to that night, Eddie could still feel the sickness that he’d experienced when Myra started going after him. She’d screamed at him. She’d cried. She’d broken things. Somehow, it wasn’t truly until that moment that he’d realized just how like his mother she was. Even on the night he’d left, she’d been dramatic, but this was different. She had even chased him down the steps like Sonia had all those years ago. But things were different this time. He was an adult and he didn’t have to go back.

He would never have to go back again.

“Lawyer,” he repeated with a strained smile. “I left her that night, Rich. Bill said he was worried because I wasn’t answering your calls. Richie, please believe me,” he said, struggling to find the right words. He couldn’t believe that Richie had let him speak this long. None of his best outcomes had gotten him this much time. “I’m sorry. I am," he insisted, despite the instinctive dismissal of his apology. I'm sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry I didn't tell you. I'm sorry about the stupid fucking worthless note. I'm sorry I let it go this far. I just…" he dropped his hands against his thighs and the sound drew Richie's attention back to him. This was it. This was his last shot. "I want you, Richie. There’s never been anyone else that I’ve ever loved.”

In the silence, he saw Richie’s resolve falter. “I don’t know,” Richie said finally. “You hurt me. I don’t know if I can-'' he trailed off. Anything he was going to say would have been a lie. What? Can’t forgive you for being manipulated by your wife? Can’t forgive you for wanting a clean slate to be with me? Can’t forgive you for being afraid to call? Can’t love you? Lie. Lie, lie, lie, lie, lie. He sighed. “What do you want from me, Eds? What did you expect? You’d walk in here and explain yourself and I’d leave someone at the altar?”  _ Altar _ . Fuck, he was getting married, wasn’t he?  _ Fuck _ ! “He is a good man. He is sweet and handsome, and determined, and he wants to marry me and you just want me to what?”

Those were all good questions. Eddie wasn’t sure what he’d expected. He did, however, know what he wanted. “Ever since that fucking phonecall triggered all of my memories to start coming back, there’s only one thing that’s been constant in what I want.” He stepped closer. Richie nodded a little, urging him on. Even if his suspicions were right, he was going to need to hear it before he even thought about upending his life. 

Who was he kidding? He’d made a strong showing today, but there was no denying that, since the ripe old age of 10, he was Eddie’s. Likewise, Eddie was his. They’d move heaven and Earth for each other.

Still, he needed to hear him say it.

“It’s you, Richie,” he said. He knew it was asking a lot, but he couldn’t help it. “Ever since we were kids. You were the only reason I even went back to Derry. All I want is you, in whatever way you’ll let me.” He tried for Richie’s hand again. His heart sped up excitedly when Richie didn’t pull away, instead looking down at their joined hands. “I would never, never have… I always meant to come back to you. By the time I could-”

“I was with someone else,” he provided. It was a simple fact. There was no hurt. There was no blame. He was with someone else. That wasn’t necessarily an open door, he supposed. He took a deep breath and pulled Eddie a little closer, running his thumb gently over the curve of his hand. “Why didn’t you come sooner? Why didn’t you-”

Eddie shook his head. “A million reasons. Everyone said you were happy and to leave you alone. I was afraid you would hate me and I know now that that’s true, so-”

Richie blanched. “I’m mad, Eddie. I don’t hate you. I could never-” He stopped and rubbed his eyes with a frustrated groan. “I’m allowed to be mad,” he said. He stared up at the ceiling. Richie couldn’t believe this. This type of shit didn’t happen in real life. Especially not to middle-aged gay comedians. It happened in lifetime movies. It happened in trashy beach reads. Not Richie Tozier’s autobiography. But here he was. “I mean, you left me. Again! Third time.” He shook his head. “Shouldn’t I believe that this time you mean it?”

Running through his memories, Eddie could only come up with one other time. When they were 16, Eddie and Richie had secretly started dating. He hadn’t known how to tell him when his mom announced that they were going to live with his aunts for the whole summer before he went to college. Instead, he wrote him a note. He couldn’t even deliver it in person. He’d taped it to the windshield of Richie’s car the morning they left. He couldn’t remember what the note said, exactly, but it ended with “I can’t bring myself to say goodbye. I love you too much for that. Instead, I’ll say see you when I see you. Call me if you’re ever in New York.” It had been brusque, he knew, but they both needed it to be a clean break. That was the only fair way. 

He shook his head. “Richie, I only left you once before that. We were kids and I was moving. Long-distance hardly works for adults, how-”

Tears welled in Richie’s eyes. “That’s not it, Eds. There’s one in the middle.”

“We didn’t remember each other in the middle,” he said quietly. It didn’t make sense. He’d only ever slept with Myra before Richie, so it wasn’t like there was even a chance that they’d had a one-night stand that Richie remembered and he didn’t. “What’s the second time,?”

“Derry.” Richie’s answer was straight and to the point. When they’d been battling Pennywise that final time, Richie wasn’t going to leave his side. He wasn’t going to leave him bleeding and injured while they fought It. Eddie insisted. He went to help their friends. When he came back, Eddie was gone. “You died,” Richie clarified. “For almost 5 minutes, you were dead. You left me for good.” He broke down, crying hysterically. “I lost you and I wasn’t even there to-”

Eddie wrapped him in his arms. “I’m sorry. I’m here. That wasn’t for good. I’m right here.” He closed his eyes as Richie clung to him tighter. “I’m so sorry about all of it. I’m not going anywhere this time, Richie. I swear. Not if you don’t want me to.” He pulled back a little and looked Richie in the eyes. “Just tell me you don’t want me to.”

That was the part Eddie was most scared of. That was the part with so many variables, Eddie thought that, maybe, he was in the wrong line of work because, as a risk analyst, he should have a better idea of what was going to happen next.

When Richie brought his mouth crashing down on his, Eddie realized there were outcomes he hadn’t even thought of. Outcomes, like this, that he liked much better than his own. He let Richie kiss him, mad and desperate. He let himself be pushed back against the wall. He brought his hands up to Richie’s neck and deepened the kiss. By the time they broke apart, both men were flushed and breathless. “I have to-”

Eddie smiled. “Go. Do what you have to do.” He reached up and tugged him into another small kiss. “I’ll be waiting with the others.”

A goofy look crossed Richie’s face and he stayed rooted to the spot. He kissed Eddie once more. “God, I missed you,” he whispered. “We need to talk more, but-”

“There’s time,” Eddie assured. He backed out of Richie’s reach. “Plenty of time.” Richie made a grabbing motion that Eddie laughed at and sidestepped. “Go.” 

“I’m going,” he said, moving for the stairs. He looked back over his shoulder. “Promise me you won’t leave again.”

Eddie smiled up at him. “I’ll carve it in the next bridge we see.”

Some time before, when Derry Home Hospital finally released Eddie, stunned that, despite the severity of the wound, Eddie was healing in record time. For most people, this would have been a catastrophic wound. Eddie, who had been brought to them with a hole the size of a tree trunk in his middle, seemed, now, to be in perfect health, save for a little spider of scar on his chest and back. His organs, his spine, they had all taken to their respective treatments and, with some physical therapy and occupational therapy, he would be good as new. 

Richie had been the one to stay with him. Richie had been the one to bring him out of the hospital. Richie had been the one who insisted on one stop on their way out of dodge. 

As they rolled to a stop on the Kissing Bridge, Eddie’s eyes searched the old wood. “Why are we here, Richie?” he asked.

“I gotta show you something.” He opened the passenger side door and helped Eddie out. “It’ll only take a second.”

Eddie eyed him warily. “If there is a carving up here that says that you fucked my-”

“Shut up and look, Eddie,” he laughed, gesturing to a spot on the topmost board. R + E in a heart. 

Eddie stared at it for a long while. “Richie,” he whispered, in awe. “When did you?-”

He took a step back and eyed it curiously, allowing himself to be overcome with all of the emotions he’d felt as a teenager, carving this as proof to himself and all of Derry that there was nothing wrong or different about how he felt about Eddie. To anyone who didn’t know, it could have been any two people with the same initials from any year that had ever passed this bridge. Robbie and Esther. Rachel and Ethan. Could have been anyone. It was the same love as the other names, bound to the wood, bearing witness to a fleeting moment in time. “That summer,” he admitted. He shrugged, then leaned on the hood of his car. “I loved you for a while before I ever bothered to tell you.”

“Richie-” he started.

“No, let me finish, Eds. I know that you have your wife and all of that. Life’s weird and complicated now, and I get that,” he said, watching as Eddie turned back to face him, leaning against the bridge himself. “But the most simple thing I know is how much I love you. How much I-”

Eddie stepped forward and rested his palm flat against Richie’s chest. Gently, he leaned in until he could feel him breathing. He kissed him. It was hesitant, at first, as if he were remembering how, but as soon as Richie’s hands dropped to his waist, it was on. He leaned him back onto the hood of the bright red sports car, grateful that this part of town was more or less abandoned now. Pulled at the hair behind Richie’s ear, tilting his head just a bit more, allowing him better access.

Richie hummed a faint moan into his mouth. He pulled back, panting. “Eds, I-”

“Not yet,” Eddie responded. He leaned down and kissed him once more. “Once we get where we’re going for the night. Then, you can tell me whatever that was going to be.” He smiled and let Richie up.

“Tease,” he laughed, straightening himself out. “God, you’re a tease.”

A coy smile crossed his lips. “I am not. I just needed a taste test.”

Richie gave him a light shove around to his door. “Fucking tease. I can not believe-” He closed the door shaking his head and still talking as he circled the car. Eddie watched him, laughing, even though he couldn’t hear the rant. “-no way I’m gonna make it all the way to…” he stopped and puzzled for a moment. “Where are we heading?” They hadn’t actually talked about it. Was he taking him with him to LA? Was he dropping him off in New York? Were they making a break for Mexico? Wherever it was, he was game.

When Eddie leaned across the center console, he gently turned Richie’s head to him. He kissed him once more. “I’m in this with you, Rich.” 

That was all the encouragement he needed. Richie drove as far as he possibly could that night before he finally gave in and got them a hotel room. The woman at the front desk raised an eyebrow curiously when her apology that they only had King rooms left for the night was met with excitement. She tried to offer a rollaway bed or to see if she might be able to find one of the fold-out couches from the suites being remodeled. Richie shook his head. “King’s perfect.”

The pair got into the elevator and took it to the fifth floor, finally reaching their door and tapping themselves in. Eddie closed the door, then turned to slip the do not disturb sign around the knob and slide the chain closed. Richie stayed behind him, pressed hard against him, sucking along his neck and nipping lightly at his earlobe. “We stopped for the night,” he reminded him. “Can we pick up where we left off now?”

Chills coursed down Eddie’s back. He reached one hand up into Richie’s hair behind him. He rocked back against the taller man, keeping his second hand against the door for balance. “Whenever you’re ready,” he said, knowing they’d both been on pins and needles all day. 

Richie slid his hand around Eddie’s middle, sliding it down closer to the waistband of his pants. He teased his thumb along the edge of the fabric, then pressed his hips against Eddie’s just a little harder. “I don’t even want to wait to get you to the bed. What if we start right here?” He adjusted his grip and took off Eddie’s shirt. In one swift motion, it was gone, flung to the side to be dealt with later. 

“Starting here is good,” he answered, reaching back for Richie, “but I want to see you.” He readily undid the button on the front of his jeans and slipped his hand inside of his briefs, trailing his fingers along the soft flesh within. “I want to see all of you and I can’t do that pressed against the wall,” he said. He tried not to sound overeager, but he wanted this desperately. He’d wanted it since the first time he’d rubbed one off himself and could only find mental images of Richie. Or how the few times he’d been able to get it up for his wife was after watching some raunchy stand up special on late-night TV with some lanky guy in glasses who just… looked so familiar. Grinding himself lightly back against Richie, he knew, based only on the little groans coming from him that he was going to need to see his face when he finished. He needed that mental image. For science. 

That was good enough for him. 

He sucked a glistening trail of kisses across down on Eddie’s neck and finally let his hand drift down to Eddie’s cock. He palmed down on it and Eddie gasped his name. He had imagined that sound a hundred ways a thousand times. It was just a little tease, but Eddie moving against him made Richie sure that he was right about that. “Eager, are we?” he cooed, almost too close to his ear, ending another shiver down his spine.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for this, Richie.” He smiled, turning to finally face him and reached up to kiss him. “But I'd prefer not to wait any longer." Richie lifted his eyebrows suggestively, then tore open the snaps on the front of his shirt. "Of course, you were prepared to do that," he said, shaking his head. He took Richie’s hand and laced their fingers together, watching with fascinated wonder as Richie’s longer ones nearly encapsulated his own. 

In the five steps it took for him to push Richie back to the bed, he realized that it wasn’t only the gushy, metaphorical sense that he was falling, but the literal as well. Having missed the bed completely, he brought the pair of them crashing to the floor with a dramatic thud. Bracing himself and rolling to avoid Eddie, Richie, instead, crashed into the dresser, nearly knocking over the TV in the process. He sat up urgently, "Are you okay? Oh my God, are your stitches-"

Stunned to silence, Eddie took a quick mental inventory. When a slight shake started in his chest, Richie knelt over him. "Eds, please talk to me." Eddie still didn't answer, but instead covered his face with his arms. "Eddie, what hurts? Talk to me."

Eddie gasped, then dissolved into giggles, completely lost. "We got a king-size bed-" he barked a huge laugh, "A KING size bed to fuck in and I was so eager," he uncovered his face revealing tears streaming down his red cheeks, "that we missed!" He reached up and gently stroked Richie’s cheek. "We missed the fucking king-sized bed."

"Eddie…" Richie said quietly, trying to nudge him onto his side so he could see his back.

He looked up at the look of mounting concern on Richie’s face and laughed even harder. "Come on, it's funny!" He managed to get out, reaching out and rubbing Richie’s arm. 

"Please let me check-" he sighed and dropped back on his heels. "I don't think you’re understanding the gravity of the situation!" He stopped, the slightest hint of a smile twitching at his lips, creasing the corners of his eyes. With his own slight break, Eddie’s resolve crumbled into desperate, contagious cackling. Richie was extremely susceptible to Eddie's contagious laugh. Before long, he was a goner too, laying on his side and pulling Eddie in close. "The Gravity-"

Eventually, the two managed to pull themselves together, and in the ensuing silence, they moved back toward each other, regaining their motion. 

In the months that followed, Eddie would often go back to that one night as a gleaming beacon of hope. They had managed, even just for one miraculous night, to make things work between them. It was supposed to be forever. It was supposed to be just them. But he'd realized that, in order to do it right, he needed to be able to say that he was Richie’s and Richie’s alone.

Now, that responsibility fell to Richie. 

Calling off a wedding didn’t take nearly as much time or effort as Eddie would have imagined. Less than fifteen minutes later, Richie was back. He had broken it off, told the attendees that they were more than welcome to enjoy the party, but there would be no wedding. Richie’s parents and Patty were the only ones to stay beside the Losers. That was perfect. 

Since he’d done that, it’d given a clean getaway to the jilted lover and plenty of time to get his stuff from Richie’s place and be gone.

“It feels tasteless to be here,” Richie admitted quietly to Eddie as they got their plates of food. “I have no right to…”

Eddie looked over at him, gauging the storm clouds gathering in his eyes. “Wanna get out of here?”

The would-be groom shook his head. “We can’t. Bill got you and I rode with Bev. No cars.” He poked at the steak on his plate. "Unless you think we can find a bus."

"Koo-koo-ka-choo," he said, rolling his eyes. A simple matter of transportation wasn’t going to stand in Eddie’s way. “I’ll handle that. Pack up our food, grab some cake and meet me out front.”

Eyeing him suspiciously, Richie agreed. “I swear, if you ditch me, I’m going to be pissed and marry your ex-wife out of spite since your m-”

His sentence was interrupted by a chaste kiss. “Not now, huh? I promise, I’m not leaving here without you.”

Richie smiled. “Five minutes?”

“Less,” he laughed, handing his plate to Richie. He leaned over to Bev and whispered, “Can I borrow your car for the night? I need to get him out of here-”

“Second thoughts?” she asked seriously.

He dismissed that out of hand. “No, nothing like that,” he assured. Bending over, he whispered confidentially, “He feels guilty and partying on the heels of today doesn’t feel right. No regrets, you guys enjoy, but I’m gonna get him out of here.”

Understanding the conflict, she nodded gently. Bev dug around in her purse for a moment, then pulled out the keys. “Blue Nautilus, 3rd spot from the arch.” She patted his cheek when he kissed hers in gratitude. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” she coached, knowing full well that she’d married Ben the second the ink was dry on her divorce papers so she wouldn't put it past them to elope. 

Eddie signed thank you, a quick tap of his lower lip then downward arched of a stretched flat palm, as he disappeared into the darkness. Finding the car was easy. Once again, he was baffled by his friends’ successes. Sure, he was the top in his field, but Jesus. He started it up and then pulled straight to the door. For the briefest of moments, that line of thought led to a creeping doubt. What if he wasn’t good enough for Richie? What if he realized he needed someone who understood this part of his life? What if he’d just fucked everything up for him?

Then, Richie stepped out of the door and scanned the area for Eddie. He flicked the lights and waved. By the time he reached the door, all of these thoughts were brushed aside. He was greeted by 6’2” of pure adrenaline and excitement. Any of his prior anger was gone, at least for now. 

For now, they were outta there. 

Just like when they’d left Derry, the men took off without a solid plan. They drove for an hour until they found a hotel with a vacancy. When they reached the front desk, the receptionist hardly batted an eye. Richie reached for Eddie’s hand on the counter and smiled at him. They booked the room for 3 nights, then followed the directions to room 632. On the way up, Richie texted Bev, asking for her to switch their cars out in the morning, sending her the address and some money for gas and food, promising that he’d never ask her for anything again ever and that she was the best Best Woman ever in the history of the world. 

It was a familiar set of nerves in Eddie’s body. He knew what was likely to happen. He knew that, this time, he came prepared- no impromptu body lotion and a prayer situation like last time. Richie’s suitcase was loaded with all the honeymoon preparation. A shiver chased his spine. Had he really pushed it that far? Richie was about to get married to someone who wasn’t him. And then what? He tried telling himself that if he was willing to break it off on his wedding day, he’d have broken it off whenever it happened. Still. He couldn’t be so sure. 

The pair stood at the foot of the bed, not touching, the breath between them as tense as their thoughts. Richie surveyed Eddie, terrified that he might bolt. He knew that was something he’d have to work on. He knew, in the logical part of his brain, that it wasn’t fair. The first two hadn’t been Eddie’s fault and so much had happened and he, himself, was a party to the third. Still, for the time being, he was afraid. He was standing on the precipice of everything he’d ever wanted. It made sense that he might worry about it all crumbling out from under him.

Eddie moved to him first. He rested his right hand flat on Richie’s chest, feeling the thrum of his heart beneath his shirt. He looked up at him and smiled. "Should we try the bed this time?"

Laughing, Richie pressed their foreheads together, then pulled Eddie into a tight embrace. Eddie sank into his arms, feeling the adrenaline high crash. “Will you hate me if I just want to hold you and talk?”

He thought it over for a moment, then tugged Richie into the bathroom. “Shower first.” When Richie moved to object, he clarified. “No funny business, I swear. I just,” he looked up at him imploringly, “I just want to be close to you but I need to shower.” Richie looked at him skeptically. “I’ve been awake for days. I was in a plane with Ben for a while, then went home and drank, then Bill called, I got on another plane, then got in a car. My skin is crawling, but I don’t want to not be with you right now. Do you know how much oil and bacteria your face alone gathers throughout the day, Richie? I don’t want to get in a bed and lay too close to you before I feel like I’m-”

Richie smiled again and swept Eddie into his arms, carrying him the rest of the way into the bathroom. “Yesterday, I never thought I’d hear you rattle on about bacteria again,” he said, peppering his face with kisses.

Eddie laughed, wriggling against him with no real fight. Richie put him down on the bathroom counter and they both started to undress. He dug his knees lightly into Richie's hips as he started undoing his belt and doffing his clothes, folding them neatly into a stack on the counter. "I’m not that easy to get rid of."

With a quick curl of his lip, Richie quipped, as he undid his shirt and let it drop unceremoniously to the floor, "Yeah, you’re like herpes. Speaking of which-" Before he could finish his thought, he caught him by the mouth, cutting him off with a muffled "Ngh."

Playfully, Eddie pulled back to admonish him with a quick "No," keeping his cheeks bunched out in an exaggerated chubby bunny.

Unbuttoning his pants, he let gravity take care of the rest. "You do realize that if you’re going to kiss me every time I make a statement that grosses you out, you’re going to Pavlov me into being an even bigger perv than I already am?" He moved to turn the shower on and tested the temperature before stepping in

Eddie shrugged, following suit. "It’s what I’ve wanted to do since we were, like 10 years old so, I mean, I figured as-" Suddenly, the gentle hand that was stretching out past him and brought the tiny bottle of shampoo back with. When it landed in his hair instead of Richie’s, he was thrown off. "Woah. What are you doing?"

"Washing your hair," Richie answered plainly. 

When he had suggested that they shower together, somehow, that wasn’t really what he had pictured. In fact, finding himself in the middle of it, he wasn't entirely sure what he'd pictured. "Is that- Is that a thing?" He asked, feeling a little stupid. 

Suddenly unsure of himself, Richie hesitated, then shrugged. "I mean, we’re in the shower together. I’m here and it’s way easier for me to reach." He laughed a little, realizing he'd never really thought about what showering together without sex would mean. It was intimate and vulnerable, but so was their entire relationship. It had been forever. "I mean. Why not?"

Eddie, however, wasn't sold. He certainly was enjoying it. "It’s just so-

"I can stop," Richie said, taking the pressure off and stepping away. 

"Don’t."

Placing a gentle kiss on his shoulder, Richie smiled and continued on. He watched as Eddie's eyes closed, enjoying the sensation more than he'd expected him to. He couldn't help but wonder when the last time he'd had anyone just take care of him. If he ever had. 

Now that he thought about it, Richie wasn't sure that he had experienced it himself either. It was nice. It was different. He was really enjoying it. So much so, when Eddie grabbed for a washcloth, he moved to intercept it. "Let me get your back, too."

That was a bridge too far for Eddie. He shifted reflexively away from his hand. He turned around but couldn't bring himself to look him in the eye. "You don’t have to-"

"Eds-" And then he realized what he was avoiding. The scar. Gently, Richie thumbed over Eddie's jaw and smiled. "I’ve got it. Let me help you." He kissed him, as tenderly as he'd ever imagined, then turned Eddie back so he could continue. As he did, a hesitant question formed on his lips. "Does it-" hurt, he meant to say, but let the thought die away. It was a stupid question, he chastised himself, and if Eddie didn't want him to see or touch his scar, he certainly didn't want to talk about it. 

Nevertheless, Eddie answered as though he'd heard the question aloud. "If it’s too cold. Or if I’ve been standing for too long."

"Hm. Does-" He debated asking another invasive question, but stopped himself. "Is there anything I can do to help?" he asked instead.

Considering it carefully, Eddie shook his head at first, then shrugged. He'd never really thought about it. This was nice, but he wasn’t sure it was exactly helping. "I don’t know. We’ll find out." There was time. He exhaled, remembering that there was, for the first time in his life, no clock. When Richie handed the washrag to Eddie, he certainly didn't expect the immediate- "Your turn?

"If you can reach," he joked, trying hard not to sound like he wanted it as badly as he did.

Eddie laughed, easily maneuvering them around in the large shower. “Asshole,” he laughed as he squeezed a dollop of shampoo into his hand.

Quietly, Richie added under his breath, “No, I mean that’s hairy too but I don’t tend to shampoo-” With a quick tug to his hair, he laughed, giving up the joke. “Okay. Yes, fine,” he acquiesced.

It dawned on him that that was not the first time he’d washed Richie’s hair for him. “Do you remember when we first started dating and you wanted so badly to look like Billie Joe Armstrong,” he mused, working the lather in nicely, then massaging Richie’s scalp for a bit longer than he needed to, “so we bleached your hair and used lime jello as a dye because we couldn’t find any actual green?” 

“Yeah,” Richie laughed, tilting his head back a little to work with Eddie before moving into the spray of the showerhead. “Little did we know you should probably not rinse it out onto your face because, you know, if it’ll dye your hair-” he trailed off, gesturing toward his face. Had the incident occurred a few years later, he’d have made jokes for weeks about his swamp. Instead, he opted to speak in Kermit The Frog’s particularly nasally timbre. 

“Your mother was so mad!” Eddie reminisced, flashes of Maggie’s displeasure fleeting through his memory.

Richie shook his head. “Only because we didn’t ask her.” He tried not to react as Eddie scrubbed down the center of his back, but he couldn’t help the shiver. “How was I supposed to know that my mother would have known what Manic Panic was and where to get it AND that good old Maggie would have done it for me? I didn't expect to learn that my parents' Honeymoon to London was prompted by a Roxy Music concert!”

Snickering lightly, Eddie moved toward Richie and kissed his shoulder before hanging the washrag up. They were silent for a while, each washing independently and trying to pretend that they weren’t catching the other staring. "She’s probably pissed now, huh?"

"Again, only because I didn’t tell her," Richie said, wondering to himself if that was going to be a concern for Eddie moving forward. He made a mental note to make sure that time with his parents was scheduled for soon after. He turned to face Eddie and looked at him, leaning against the shower wall. "After Derry, she asked a couple of times. Bill and Stan were back in my life so where the hell were you? That type of thing." Eddie nodded, halting his methodic scrubbing and devoting his full attention to Richie. "I told her it was complicated. I'd seen you but adult life is so Goddamn weird." He brushed a strand of hair from in front of Eddie's face and rolled his eyes. "She didn't really buy it. Apparently, she called Stan but he only gave her the Reader's Digest. Especially considering that I didn't really tell anyone but Bill anything…"

Eddie looked down bashfully. "I told Stan everything."

He had. The moment he'd left he needed to tell someone. Richie wasn’t answering his phone calls. The next best thing was Stan. He'd listened as he told him about leaving Derry, the hotel, his realization, Myra's ensuing breakdown. In less than a week, he'd managed to burn his life to the ground and, somehow, the only part he really wanted to rebuild was Richie. 

Stan, bless him, had kept his confidence despite Bill’s constant urging that he cut Eddie out. He couldn’t blame him. Bill didn’t know better. But he didn’t understand why he couldn’t, at least, give him the benefit of the doubt. Surely, he deserved at least that. The problem was that Stan wasn’t going to interfere. They were adults. If they were going to throw everything away over a lack of communication, that was on them and he wouldn’t be a party to it.”

“Oh,” Richie said, thinking it over. It was on par, he supposed. He nodded, then added, “Well, thankfully, that means he's probably the only one who knew because he’s not the type to air out other people’s dirty laundry.” A few more moments passed in comfortable silence as they turned off the shower and began to dry themselves off. “I think she always wanted it to be you, though,” he added, leaning back against the vanity thoughtfully, “which is why she was always trying to push me to ask Steve out.” Eddie looked back at him in the mirror, confused. He shrugged, then explained. “Same vague description, I guess. But it's like craving Apple Jacks but all you can get your hands on is Apple Zings.”

Eddie laughed hard at the comparison. The worst part about it was that he understood completely. If you were to describe both men to someone who’d never seen either, he supposed they could be as interchangeable as Ryan Murphy’s neverending parade of brunette twunks. But apparently, not to Richie, a fact that made Eddie’s heart flutter. 

As he digested that sugary sentiment, they readied to crawl into bed. Richie’s carry-on had some clothes in it, but not so much on the loungewear. Both men wound up in pairs of Richie’s underwear. Richie had started to make a few halfhearted jokes, but Eddie deflected each one with a kiss.

Later, laying in bed, Eddie curled tightly around Richie’s right side, a thought occurred to him. “You’ve been out publicly?”

He felt Richie nod against his hair. “Yeah. I mean, to my family and close friends. And obviously you guys. You’ve known forever.” He slowly trailed his fingers up and down Eddie’s arm and added “I had never made a public statement about it or anything, but people have speculated. I mean, if you google my name, ‘gay?’ is like the 4th option down. It wouldn’t have been the end of the world. Wouldn’t have been great for my image but I’d have managed.”

That was such a stark contrast to the way he’d known Richie to feel about it. “That doesn’t mean that-”

Richie sighed and tilted his head up to look at him. “Eddie, even not remembering Derry, I still knew who I was. The shame was so specifically centered around Derry, for me. Not being bi.” Eddie still seemed confused, so he elaborated. “It was the way that town made me feel about it. Made us feel about it.”

Despite appreciating the inclusion, Eddie didn’t share that sentiment in the least. His mother had always been very clear about her opinions of “the queers.” He distinctly remembered her reaction every time she heard anything about the AIDS epidemic when he was a kid. “Those dirty homos brought it on themselves,” she’d growl at the news. “They shouldn’t even be allowed in the hospital. They should let them all die in the streets.” 

A shiver coursed his spine. Even years after she was gone, he could still hear her inane remarks. He hated it. Maybe even hated her. “Not for me,” he assured. “You know it was always-”

“Yeah,” Richie answered. He knew. He’d heard Sonia rail against her ‘delicate’ son, insisting that other people would think certain things about him. That they’d assume things. He remembered one night, especially, where she’d insisted that all of the men who were dying of AIDS got what was coming to them for their perversions; that the Ryan White CARE Act was a waste of her tax dollars. She had told Eddie that any mother who let her son’s name be attached to something like that deserved to have to buy a gravestone for him, too. It wasn’t for a few more years that he realized why it hadn’t sat right with him, but when it did, he had almost stormed over to Eddie’s and tore into his mother. He might have done it, too, but that would have outed them both and he was not ready for that. 

Eddie sighed, then buried himself in Richie’s chest. As Eddie’s own chest started to rise and fall unevenly, Richie panicked. “Hey, you okay?” No answer. The ragged breaths turned to the sound of sniffles. “Are you crying?” He tried to lift Eddie’s chin to gauge his emotions. Concern growing deep within him, he slid down until they were face to face and Eddie was- laughing.

Hysterically, unstoppably, broken up laughing. He rolled flat on his back and let out a loud, cackling blast. “I can't believe I married her fucking stunt double,” he wheezed.

For a moment, Richie watched, gauging the nature of his outburst. Eventually, when he was sure it wasn’t going to turn into tears or, worse, a nightmare in which the laughing would continue and Eddie would morph into Pennywise and chase him until he woke up, a common theme of his nightmares A.D.- After Derry- he joined in the laughter, too.

It felt good. It felt right. Laying there, laughing and talking with the one person he could truly say he’d ever really loved, the world seemed to fall into place. There was no pressure. No hiding. No playing a part in an attempt to be who the other person needed them to be or thought they were. 

Despite the fact that it had been a tremendously long day, neither could quiet their mind to sleep. Talking through the dawn was old hat for them, surely, but this was different. It felt different.

Following one period of silence, Eddie watched Richie’s hands entwine with his. “Do you think we would have-” he started to ask. Richie looked toward him, waiting for the end. “No, it’s stupid,” he dismissed, realizing that maybe he didn’t want to know the answer.

“Yes, you are, but keep talking anyway,” Richie quipped, hooking his right leg up and over Eddie’s, rocking him pointedly.

“Fucker,” Eddie laughed, shoving him off and sitting up.

Silently lamenting the loss of contact, Richie answered, “Not yet,” then pulled him back down, pinning him under his body weight, biting at his shoulder playfully.

Rolling his eyes, Eddie shifted. “Would you stop?” he whimpered and rocked Richie off of him unceremoniously. 

“Okay, I’m sorry,” he said, throwing his hands up in forfeit. “Continue.”

With a sigh, Eddie gave in to the realization that he was going to have to ask because a curious Richie was a dog with a bone. He’d drag it out of him one way or another. “Do you think that, if we had stayed in Derry, we would have stayed together?”

Richie responded, “Yes,” without skipping a beat. He was secure in his knowledge of himself and of what his relationship with Eddie was, both then and in high school. He would never have let Eddie go by choice. 

A thoughtful hum broke from Eddie’s throat. He didn't want to seem skeptical, but given the story of their lives, it didn't seem likely. He'd given it a fair bit of thought since Derry, but he could never think about it for too long. Thinking about it without Richie hurt too much. 

"I also think that if we had met again in the time between, I’d have remembered you and never let you out of my sight. Wife or no wife," Richie added as he trailed his fingers up and down Eddie’s arm gently

He leaned back and laughed. "Oh, really?"

"Definitely," he assured. "I also think that if we had been born and raised anywhere but Derry, we’d have been together all along."

He raised an eyebrow playfully. "Is that so?" He'd hoped his tone was flirty enough that it came off as a joke-

But Richie knew him better than that. Richie knew him better than anyone. "You don’t think so?" he asked. He tried not to let the sting come through, but the puppy dog eyes were in full force. 

"I’d hope so," Eddie clarified, rolling practically on top of Richie, "but who can really know for sure?" 

Richie shrugged in response. Sure, there was no real certainty, but it was a feeling. An instinct. If, after everything they'd gone through, they wind up laying in a bed together that night, it was going to happen no matter what. 

Even if that were the case, Eddie didn't think it was that simple. Something about it didn't rest easy with him. "And is that better? Knowing that we could have had a life together and didn’t get to because of It?" He supposed, realistically, that it didn’t make any difference, but still. In this proposed reality, he could have had 27 years with Richie. That’s 27 years they couldn’t ever expect to get back.

Rolling onto his side, he shook his head. "I guess not." He understood where Eddie was coming from. He did. But he just couldn’t see it that way. "But, we’re not that old. We can still have a life." As far as Richie was concerned, a second with Eddie was better than a year without. Whatever time they got was more than either of them would have expected the night before.

"Obviously," he said, rolling his eyes. He knew that and he’d never exchange it. Never. "But not a lifetime,” he added, realizing how it really did affect him.

"Says who? Maybe defeating It means we get to live forever," Richie suggested. 

Eddie flopped onto his back. "Richie-" he groaned, trying to keep the conversation fairly serious. These were things that they really did need to talk about.

That was the thing. Richie was dead serious. The one thing that Eddie seemed to have forgotten was that Richie had seen things. The deadlights had shown him things that he still wasn’t able to talk about or even fully comprehend. "You’re living proof of it,” he said, propping himself on his elbow and gesturing alongside the puckered scar along Eddie’s chest. "Maybe we’re immortal." When his suggestion was greeted with a sharply exhaled laugh, he groaned and flipped his hand over noncommittally. "Or maybe we die in this bed tonight,” he offered as a drastic alternative, “but at least I get to know, when I fall asleep tonight, that I love you and you love me and whatever happens next is kind of a bonus." He took Eddie’s hand and laced it within his own before kissing it gently. He looked directly down into the same brown eyes that had warmed his dreams for as long as he could remember and all the times he couldn’t. "Every second we get to spend together from here on out is worth it."

Silence enveloped the men. A million thoughts clamored for attention, but the only one that made its way through to Eddie’s mind was that Richie had said that he loved him. After everything else, all the time, everything that had happened- Richie loved him. "I do. You do know that, right?" he asked, leaning up to bring himself even closer.

"What?" Richie asked. 

Eddie let the budding smile tug into a broad one. "Love you," he confirmed. 

By the time Richie was able to board Eddie’s train of thought, Eddie was flush on top of him, kissing him freely. "Yeah. I think I get the picture,” he answered between breathless moments. Still, unable to shut his own brain off, Richie had a thought. Just one thought and he was laughing hysterically, so far gone that he almost bit Eddie.

"What?" he asked, baffled.

"Nothing," he answered, clearly lying, as he threw his arms over his face, trying to hide the fit from him.

Playfully impatient, Eddie demanded, "No, why are you laughing?" He rose to his knees, straddling him.

Richie was insistent. "It’s nothing! It’s-"

He rocked forward and fought to pry his arms up. "Richie, come on. Just tell me,” he laughed, rocking forward dangerously. Seeing the reaction it got out of Richie, he did it again. He brought himself flush against Richie and kissed him, finally pinning his arms over his head. He raised his eyebrows expectantly.

In an attempt to avoid the face he knew Eddie was about to pull, he stared straight up at the ceiling. "I can’t believe you almost let me marry someone else." He made it about two words before busting up himself.

"What?" Eddie laughed, astounded. 

It was bizarre. Here they were, lying in bed together like that was the plan all along. "When I woke up this morning, I was going to marry someone else and you were just going to let it happen," he mused, laughing hysterically. 

Eddie’s jaw hung wide open. "Let it-" He slid his hands up into Richie’s and leaned in to kiss him. Richie, however, couldn’t make the kiss work through his unbridled laughter. Eddie leaned back and groaned. "Oh, come on. I didn’t know it was happening until Ben told me and I didn’t think you would hear me out even then, but I couldn’t take not knowing." He pouted until Richie quieted. "I expected you to tell me to go fuck myself." Richie blinked, trying to piece together when Eddie’s tone had gotten serious. He leaned up on his elbows and watched him carefully. "I could only hope that you’d still want me, even a little,” Eddie admitted. 

Richie looked up at the man so carefully perched over him. He didn’t know what to say. He understood his fear. He certainly couldn’t blame him for staying away. He would have, too. As a matter of fact, he did. He could have chased Eddie across the country. He could have made more of an effort. But, to him, it looked like the decision had been made. It was over. 

He sighed, taking Eddie’s hand gently. "You know, there were about a million and five scenarios I’d come up with about what the next time I saw you would be,” he mused. Eddie continued to watch quietly. "Where, when, what I’d be wearing, what you’d be wearing. What you’d say. How I’d feel." He smiled up at him, looking as reassuring as he could. "None of them were even close to right."

"Why?"

“I saw you and it was right. It was perfect. It was the perfect way to see the person I was going to marry. Except, it wasn’t. And then, once I realized that it wasn’t perfect,” he answered, nodding his head a little to get Eddie to lift up so he could sit more comfortably, “and I was pissed. More at myself, I think, than anything else. I mean, seeing you in front of me on my wedding day is exactly how my life was supposed to be. But in this timeline, I wasn’t marrying you.” He brought his arms around Eddie’s waist and pulled him closer. “And all of the sudden, it hurt. I’d thrown myself into this impending marriage of convenience without taking the time to actually think about it. If I thought about it, I’d have realized that it was wrong.” He released a light laugh and rolled his eyes, remembering that first phone call with Bev. “Everyone told me so and I ignored them. But still, there you were.” He brought one hand up to smooth the hair along the side of Eddie’s face, then kissed him. “And I was so sorry. You were right there and so sad and so hurt and it was as much my fault as it was yours. I could have answered your calls. I could have made some of my own. But,” he inhaled, pretending to be much calmer than the admission really let him, “I was pissed. And hurt. And scared. Seeing you again was going to change everything, no matter what.” He shook his head and closed his eyes, trying to let them betray the faint bruising his heart had taken. “My knee jerk reaction was to kiss the breath right out of you. And that amplified all the pissed off, hurt, scared in me. How could I just instantly be cool with everything?”

“I’m still wondering that, myself,” Eddie interrupted. The worry in his voice betrayed him, even though Richie was already planning to explain.

With a smile, he rested their foreheads together sleepily. “Because it was  supposed to be us all along." 

That wasn't the answer Eddie had been looking for. They were adults. He had fucked up and, while he certainly didn't want it to be held against him, he knew that an apology was important in regaining that trust, and he wanted to earn it. "That doesn't mean what I did was right. I am so sorry, Richie. The way I did it-"

Richie kissed his way across Eddie’s face, punctuating his response. "You've apologized. I've accepted your ap-"

"Will you let me finish, asshole?" Eddie interrupted, words bubbling up in his core. He had things that he had to say and he would be damned if Richie was going to stop him now.

Without so much as a pause for station identification, Richie yelped, "Asshole? I'm just trying to-"

"Yes, asshole,” Eddie said sarcastically, leaning back to keep himself out of kissing range. “I need to say this and I need you to hear-"

He gave him a little shove, playfully ousting him from his lap. He continued, "Tell you that you don't have to keep beating yourself up-"

Without hesitation, Eddie scooted close enough that their knees were touching, his hands gripping Richie’s thighs tightly."Me out. We need to talk about it once and then it'll be done and we don't have to-"

"When it had to be done. It wouldn't have been right otherwise and-"

"Talk about it ever again but you need to know that I never meant to hurt you and-"

Years of practice had made it so that the men could have two entirely different conversations with each other. It certainly saved energy when the couple had opposing viewpoints because they could talk over one another and still, somehow, hear and understand every word the other said. This time, those viewpoints happened to both end with something that caught them both off guard. "I love you,” they said, breathlessly unanimous. 

It came so freely and so casually. They’d both said it several times earlier that day and a hundred times before that. This time was different. It was heavy with emotion and pointed but there was no expectation. It was a simple fact. And it knocked the wind out of them both.

After a moment of stunned laughter, the men quieted, staring at each other in awe. “So-” Richie started as he gently rubbed his hand up Eddie’s forearm.

“So-” Eddie nodded his head, trailing off. He couldn’t help the smile crossing his lips. Still, he couldn’t manage to get the words out.

Sensing his struggle, Richie mimed zipping his lips together. Realizing he had to say one last thing or the effect would be lost, he jokingly unzipped them, added, “Go ahead,” then quickly re-zipped them and tossed the imaginary key.

Eddie sat with his thoughts a few moments more. He needed to reassure himself that he was saying something at least close to the right thing. He rose to his knees between Richie’s legs so that they were facing each other square on. “Just, know that I will spend every day from now until fucking eternity making sure you will never wonder if I'm going to be here.” He looked down at the spot on Richie’s hip where his thumb was resting and focused on it- tactile proof that he was here and with Richie. He was so ashamed of himself and hated the fact that he had wasted so much time. He inched closer and finally looked back up at him. "I'm so sorry that I hurt you. I should have told you what was going on for me. I should have handled the whole thing differently. That part is done, now, and I promise you that I will never forget that, even though it seems like it sometimes, you cannot read my mind.” He smiled and pushed back a strand of hair that had fallen across Richie’s eyes. His hand stayed to linger on his cheek. “I'm in this with you, Richie.” Tears stinged Richie’s eyes. He didn’t know until that moment just how desperately he’d needed to hear that. More, he wasn’t prepared for the soft, sincere, “I love you,” that followed.

Part of the reason that Richie had been so adamant about not having this conversation was that he knew- he knew- that when he heard it, when he finally heard his apology, when he saw how sorry Eddie truly was outside of the heat of the moment, he would be done for. He firmly believed that Eddie didn’t have anything to apologize for. It was shifty communication. For two people who talked nonstop, they would have to work on the more intricate parts of that. But, dear God, was he not prepared to hear all of that. Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes. Eventually, when he managed to get his throat to cooperate, he choked out a hoarse, "Okay." He wrapped Eddie tightly in his arms and buried his face in the crook of his neck and repeated "Okay."

"Apology accepted?" Eddie sniffled, clutching at his broad shoulders desperately. 

"And forgiven," he assured. "I love you, Eds." He rocked them both back and forth.

Eddie pulled back to kiss him, then pulled himself back in close. “Good. You're stuck with me, now,” he said. If they kept crying and holding each other, he was fairly certain that they would also prove to be stuck to each other, but he didn’t mind. 

“Right back at ya,” Richie answered, a mischievous smile curling at his tear-stained cheeks. He rocked forward, tackling him. covered him 

When he managed to free himself, laughing and shoving until he was able to slide back to his side of the bed with a hoarse, “Dick.” He rolled onto his side and rested his head on Richie’s shoulder, his arm draped over his shoulders, as though they’d slept that way for years. Even better, when Eddie woke up the following morning, still nestled in Richie’s arms, there was no denying that it was the way he wanted to spend every morning for the rest of his life.


End file.
